Learning to Lead at the WHO: Thailand’s Global Health Diplomacy at the World Health Assembly

One of the largest delegations at the governing body of the WHO—the World Health Assembly (WHA)—hails from a small country in Southeast Asia. While Thailand’s presence through the 1990s was small, its delegation and engagement at annual WHA meetings grew substantially from the early 2000s through the 2010s, coming to rival that of the US. Thailand has tabled important resolutions at the WHA. The country serves on the WHO’s Executive Board; officials serve on politically sensitive drafting committees and have played important roles in high-profile resolutions. How and why did Thailand invest in building a presence at the WHO and what dividends have accrued from it? This article explores the development and growth of Thailand’s unique approach to global health diplomacy at the WHO, based on nearly 70 interviews with officials from the government, international organizations, non-governmental organizations, and academics. The country’s growing prominence at the WHA was part of a deliberate investment strategy that required sustained political and economic resources which allowed the country to play credible leadership roles and begin to take a proactive (rather than reactive) approach to set the global health agenda, attaining status through its growing “epistemic power” in the process.